The Cynical Guide to Saving the Day
by ValidDreams
Summary: Sabrin hates Skyrim. It's not personal, just a matter of practicality. Because sane people hate snow, civil wars, and dragons. A story told in parts about a criminal come hero.
1. Unbound

Sabrin dreamed of stones being washed away and rearranged by tides that followed an unseen hand.

On distant winds, there was a song, sung in a tongue that made her blood hot.

She dreamed of fire and smoke.

At night, her skin parted to reveal something more than sinew and blood beneath.

She dreamed of a place with honey and hope in the air and a sky filled with lights.

Wings and cold steel and a home.

Reality was not so frustrating and cryptic, but it also smelled like death.

Sabrin was no unsullied innocent. She was a thief and a killer in turns and had even been a whore when money was really scarce. Blundering into an Imperial border patrol might have been an accident, but the Imperials weren't sending some untried maiden to the block that would end up some unsung sacrifice of the war.

The point being: Sabrin doubted if the Divines had anything to do with the fact that she had managed to navigate the chaos of Helgen as it literally came down around her ears. Despite that, it was the likes of Akatosh and Arkay, Mara and Kyne that she prayed to as she beat feet over the cobbles and dodged debris.

"Ralof, you damned traitor! Get out of our way!"

"We're leaving, Hadvar, and you can't stop us this time!"

"Fine! I hope that dragon takes you all to Sovngarde!"

Dragon.

Dragon, dragon, _dragon_!

"Shut up, _shut up_!"

Sabrin rammed herself into Hadvar's back, which caused him and Ralof to collide, and the three of them fell through the Keep doors in an undignified heap of limbs and equipment as the scaled, black terror made another low dive and lit the ground afire.

Inside, they separated quickly and backed away from one another; three cornered animals looking for one to another with darting, anxious eyes.

Nords. Sabrin hated Nords. Her mother had been an Imperial and she herself was no delicate flower, but a damned Nord made even the heartiest of the other bloods look frail. These two were no exceptions.

She hated Skyrim in general. Hairy, small-minded, horse men without the sense to live somewhere warmer.

Why was she _here_?

"No closer, kinslayer," the blonde growled.

"Nor you, Stormcloak."

Sabrin glanced between the two men and realized that she was being ignored. Also, she was apparently the only one _aware_ of the fact that an ancient myth had just fallen out of the sky and was burning the place down around their ears. So clearly she was also the only one with a brain.

Speaking of which, they had apparently entered the Keep through the barracks and she had already spotted a number of footlockers and weapon racks that required her attention.

"I'm going to find some armor," she announced, loudly. She already had her rough-spun tunic that smelled like vomit and horse halfway over her head.

She made sure it hit one of them as she cast it off and turned away.

It was like they had just remembered that there was a reason they were there together and not sad little scorch marks marring the cobbles outside and looked at her like she had grown a dog's head.

"If you intend to follow this traitor, I cannot let you—"

"You cannot trust someone who was just going to execute—"

Sabrin whirled around to look at them and flailed her newly acquired sword in their direction, forcing them both back a half-step despite the fact that she was a tiny woman in ratty pants and wraps and naught else. " _Dragon!_ " she bellowed, silencing the beginnings of their protests. "There is a flying horror outside the damned door! Get your priorities straight!"

 _That_ seemed to give them both pause.

Pushing her hair out of her eyes, she glanced between them. "Look, kill each other _later_ ," she said. "Or now, fine. But I intend to escape so leave me out of it."

With that she turned away again and began ransacking the next nearest footlocker for suitable clothing.

Hadvar and Ralof glanced at one another, weighing one another with cold, measuring looks.

"Someone needs to warn Riverwood," Ralof finally started.

"And Jarl Balgruuf," Hadvar agreed. He raised his eyes to meet Ralof's again. "A dragon could decimate them if they're taken by surprise." He shifted his weight. "I would not see the innocent harmed…"

"Nor I."

"So?"

The other Nord lifted his chin. "The Stormcloaks will not go away," he said stubbornly. "But a dragon… that will not either. We do this first."

Then Hadvar was promptly hit in the face with another bundle of ragged cloth and Sabrin passed between them in a pair of new boots and leather armor. "That was really sweet," she said. "Now let's not die."


	2. The Dragonborn

_"You two are from the same village? Doesn't that mean you grew up together? And now you're prepared to kill each other over… what again? If that isn't proof of how stupid this war is, I just don't know what else you need."_

 _"You obviously do not worship Talos."_

 _"Actually, I don't worship anything. Except maybe coin. And staying alive."_

 _"The Empire had no choice—"_

 _"Excuses meant to—!"_

 _"Oh, both of you shut up. Gods, I'm sorry I ever asked."_

* * *

With the barrow behind them, they ended up making camp somewhere outside of Riverrun. A few hours of sleep, they had decided, would do them well before they attempted to the long run back to Whiterun.

"Are you going to tell us what happened in there?"

Sabrin watched the colors of the auroras dance along the distant mountaintops, forming bright belts and streams of light that played against the endless field of stars above them. She hated the cold, but this really was something to see.

" _Sabrin_."

She looked, finally, to Hadvar.

What was she supposed to say? They didn't trust each other as it was, so what good would it do to tell them that she had heard voices and seen lights that clearly weren't there?

And that word.

Ralof had been all aglow with childish excitement as he examined that wall, going on about the history of such things and the language that was carved into its face. It was the ancient tongue of the dragons or some such nonsense and there were few alive, save for the monks that lived at the Throat of the World, that could read it.

And Sabrin.

Sabrin, who had never seen the script in her life, but who had taken one look at it and knew it like she knew her own face and flesh.

Force. _Fus_. It felt fused into her bones, like it was more than a word.

"Nothing happened. That draugr hit like a runaway horse cart. I was just dazed."

The men shared another look and neither obviously believed her, but their attentions turned to the rabbit meat they were roasting.

"Then let us talk of something else. You know of us, tell us where you hail from."

Sabrin glanced at Ralof. If this was his way of lightening the mood, he was doing a terrible job. "My mother was from the Imperial City, but I've never been there. She worked as a mercenary, so I spent my childhood with caravans she guarded. She died when I was still a girl and I was taken in by a Khajiit named Shagh." She shrugged. "She taught me to fight and Shagh taught me to survive."

"The lockpicking?" Hadvar guessed.

"Among other things."

"So, this Shagh, where is he now?"

"Dead."

Hadvar hesitated a second and then nodded. "I'm sorry."

"So am I."

"What brought you to Skyrim?" Ralof asked.

She looked at him again. "I needed to leave Cyrodiil and north was as valid an option as anything. I was hoping to use the war here as cover. Granted, I didn't intend to end up in the middle of it."

Hadvar's brows furrowed in concern. "For what? Why were you running?"

"I owed some very bad people a great deal of money."

"And you didn't have it, I take?"

"I did, I just wasn't going to give it to them." She glanced around the camp and then upwards at the sky. "We should get started back toward Whiterun before morning. One of you can take first watch, just don't argue about it all night."

* * *

The dragon was terrifying.

And beautiful.

And also the wrong dragon.

Sabrin wasn't very smart, but she was never going to forget the dragon that had landed on the Keep in Helgen. Those inky, black scales like finely cut ebony and those eyes like hearth fires. She had stared into them herself, had had the best view in Tamriel of the monster before it had begun its rampage, and she would never ever forget it.

And this dragon was not that dragon.

Granted, she still wanted it to die.

"I have forgotten what good sport you mortals can be!"

Because apparently even dragons could be assholes.

But the battle was almost secondary. She was burning alive and she hadn't gotten anywhere near the flames pouring from the beast's daggered maw. It was the words again. The dragon was speaking, but it wasn't Common.

And she understood. They hummed inside of her and echoed in her bones, throbbing in some deep and hidden part.

" _Fight courageously! Good! Your defeat brings me honor!_ "

What in the Void was happening?

She wasn't even afraid and that was insanity itself. This was a more certain and painful death than the headsman's axe had been. But she felt… insulted? Defensive? Whiterun wasn't even her home, she didn't care about it, but how dare another…?

"Ralof, stay away from its tail! Get the wings! Force it aground!"

The beast turned then on her. With arrows littering its hide like quills and blood pouring from a handful of wounds just deep enough to pierce its armored flesh, the dragon was a mess but no less ferocious to look upon.

And then it opened its mouth and knowing what would come next— _fire—_ Sabrin sprang forward and just managed to get her footing on the beast's head.

Instinct. She grabbed at one of its horns for balance and then drove her blade repeatedly into the back of its skull, finding that the scales and bone there yielded quickly under her assault.

The beast thrashed and she managed to deliver a final blow that seemed to sink deeper than the others before she was thrown.

More blood, pouring out like a river. The dragon took a rattling breath and she met its eyes as she rolled onto her hands and knees. For a moment, she saw in them genuine surprise and then terror.

" _Dovahkiin?! Niid!_ "

The first scale that flaked off and lifted up into the air like an errant ash from a campfire surprised her and she followed its progress upward with her eyes. Then the dragon's body, as a whole and all at once, burst into flame and threw herself backward in an attempt to get away. But even as she backed up, she felt a pull in her gut. A wind surrounded her and filled her ears with a deafening roar, there was warmth, and something… something…

She couldn't hear Irileth or the others anymore. The Housecarl was shouting for the guards to get back and distantly she could make out other voices among the cacophony, but they were so far away.

Ecstatic euphoria and completion. A wholeness she had never known, like a forlorn and unknown part of her had been awakened and set afire. Her eyes stung with tears as she was overwhelmed with the feeling and she struggled to breathe around the fullness in her chest.

Then it was gone. She could hear the deathly stillness of the clearing again and frantic approach of heavy footsteps.

But the newness lingered, like she had just awoken from a long sleep and had just opened her eyes.

A pair of hands was suddenly on her and forcing her head back. Hadvar. She stared at him blankly, still too stunned and confused by what had just transpired to respond to his frantic questions as he felt along her ribs for broken bones.

"You didn't hit your head, I don't think. Sabrin, _talk_. What were you thinking? What just—what did you just _do_? Ralof, bring me the water!"

The Stormcloak soldier was standing stunned still like the others, staring at the skeletal remains of the dragon like it might leap up and attack them again.

It was one of the guards that eventually broke the silence. In a voice that was filled with equal measures of awe and disbelief, he breathed: "I can't believe it. You're… you're Dragonborn."


	3. Sides

_"No!"_

 _"We have to talk about this! The Jarl is going to find out—everyone will eventually find out!"_

 _"It's nothing! I'm fine! It… it was a fluke. I'm not—whatever! Get away from me!"_

 _"You tore out its soul and rendered it naught but bone, girl! What power on Nirn do you think can do that on accident?"_

 _"I said leave me alone!"_

* * *

"What is she doing?"

Hadvar shrugged. "Playing tag."

Ralof stared at the man and then looked back at the town circle. Sabrin had cornered two kids on the other side of the town well and was feinting one way and then the other before finally darting left. The children ran off ahead of her, laughing breathlessly, and they all disappeared together behind one of the shops.

"And… you're letting her?"

Hadvar shrugged. "What am I supposed to do? _Stop_ her? This is the first time she's smiled all day."

"Did she speak to the Jarl?"

"On sufferance."

"What did he say?"

The Legionnaire sighed and looked to blond before him. "He gave her a title and a home here—said he wanted to know that she had somewhere warm to lay her head. She even has a _Housecarl_." He snorted. "Not bad for a prisoner on the run."

"And the—"

" _Yes_. He told her about the Greybeards."

They had been in the road arguing when the sound, like an earthquake, had nearly knocked them off their feet. If Sabrin still planned to run off without saying anything to the Jarl personally, that plan had gone up in smoke.

Hadvar had simply been grateful that she had stopped her rambling denials long enough to listen to the man.

Ralof said nothing and simply watched the woman reappear, now the one being chased, and she made an impressive show of vaulting over some barrels and leaping the opened well before racing up the steps to the Cloud District.

Whatever she had been in her life before, these things appeared natural to her. She was lean and compact, too quick and too hard to be a stranger to the fight. In the crypt, he wasn't even sure the Draugr had scared her. She had seemed more put-upon—more inconvenienced—by them than anything.

"I must report this," he said, finally. "What has happened—what she is."

Hadvar glanced at him and then looked away again. "I know."

"Will you stop me?"

"Are you asking me to?"

"You know what I am asking."

The Legionnaire shifted his weight and then lifted himself away from the wall he had been leaning on. "I am no more ready to cut you down here than I was when you left Riverwood to join Ulfric," he said. "I told you before, you have to do what you think is right."

Ralof was still staring after the woman, though his mind was clearly somewhere else. "And you? I suppose you intend to keep an eye on her for your masters?"

"I am no more their slave than you are Ulfric's." Then Hadvar shrugged. "As for the girl, we will see. I too must report. She may or may not want to delay her visit to High Hrrothgar. If that is the case, we will part here."

The blond nodded and finally brought his eyes to meet Hadvar's. "Talos guard you," he said.

"He always has."

With that, the Stormcloak turned and headed for the gates.

Hadvar watched him go until the guards had opened the gates and he disappeared beyond them. He thought about them as boys together, when Riverwood had been sleepy and at peace, when battle had been a childish dream and not a nightmare waiting for them in the morning.

Sabrin suddenly jumped on him and he staggered as he tried to balance himself and her weight against his back.

"Where's Ralof going?" she asked, her chin propped on his shoulder.

"He's a soldier, Sabrin. He needs to report in and let others know he survived Helgen."

He felt her mood shift and she slid down his back and onto her feet, like a bit of melting ice.

"He could have said goodbye."

"He might intend to find you again."

"I thought he'd stay," she said when he faced her. "We were making a good team."

"He couldn't," he said. He took a breath. "And neither can I. There are things that General Tullius needs to know."

" _Things_?" Sabrin's face hardened and she was again the scowling, calculating prisoner he had pulled off the cart back at Helgen. "About me you mean? Because Divines forbid he not know."

"What do you think Ralof is doing?" Hadvar snapped back. "He'll go back to Windhelm and tell Ulfric he knows exactly who the Dragonborn is. Do you really think the Stormcloaks will let you rest once he knows?"

"And the Empire?"

He straightened and looked away. "I honestly can't say," he muttered. "Tullius doesn't know much about our ways. He may or may not put much stock in legends—even when they're living and breathing the same air. Once he knows of the Voice, though…"

"That I can do what Ulfric does."

"Yes."

Balgruuf had been the one to coax her into an attempt. On the great porch of Dragonsreach, when there had been enough space to even try it, she shattered a series of targets and an array of pottery and scared every servant in the Hold.

"I already told you, I don't want anything to do with your war."

Hadvar shook his head. "In time, you might not have a choice."

"Someone will _make_ me choose?"

"This war isn't going to stay at this standstill. Everyone will eventually have to pick a side."

She looked around, her gaze traveling from one mark stand to another, to the flowers growing in the square, to the children in the street, and then she looked at him again. "I like _my_ side." She looked him over and then brushed by him, making her way in the direction of her new home. "Enjoy your trip to Solitude."


	4. Ru, Graan, Bovul

**Four**

 _"My Thane?"_

 _"Why don't you wait for me here, Lydia? I'll be back."_

 _"Are you sure? The steps can be perilous."_

 _"I'll be fine. I just need to think."_

* * *

Sabrin hadn't summoned the nerve yet to go inside, even though she had reached the summit of the mountain and the lonely, stone temple perched there hours ago.

So, she settled for sitting outside on the steps.

She hadn't been lying to Hadvar. Her plan after killing the dragon had been to collect whatever supplies she could get her hands on—legally or otherwise—and make the quickest possible hike for one of the borders. Because Sabrin had been a lot of things to get by in life, but she couldn't be _this_. Whatever Jarl Balgruuf saw when he looked at her with such awe and reverence or whatever the guards believed the Dragonborn was meant to do, she wasn't cut out to be that person.

There was the crunch of ice and snow behind her and then a heavy, warm weight was dropped upon her shoulders with a muted thump.

Sabrin started and lifted a hand to touch the mantle of thick fur and wool that had settled over her. Then she twisted around and found herself looking into the face of a truly ancient man, who was kneeling beside her.

"Dragonborn or no," he said. "You will freeze here, given time."

Greybeard. Apparently that was meant as literally as it was figuratively.

"I don't want to be Dragonborn."

The old man's lips curled ever-so slightly at one corner. "Then perhaps that means the gods chose wisely."

"But how do you know it's me?" she demanded. "I can't be the _only_ one. Find someone else!"

The old man let out a long breath that frosted in the chilly air. Then, with some effort, he settled onto the stone beside her. "That answer is complicated—far more complicated than the one you want." He measured her with his tired, gray eyes. "You want me to tell you that there was a mistake—that this is a dream you will wake from." Slowly, he shook his head. "I cannot. Sitting beside you I can feel your power—I can see it. Your soul burns like a hearth fire. You _are_ Dragonborn."

Sabrin scooted away from him, waving a hand as if to dismiss his words. "I'm not a Nord," she insisted.

"Do you think such things matter to the gods?" he asked. " _K_ _iir do Bormahu_ _, h_ _i los_ _Dovahkiin_."

Sabrin shivered and it had nothing to do with the winds that whistled around the peak or the numbness that had worked itself into her hands and feet. Looking away, she buried her face in the fur of the mantle he had given her and squeezed her eyes closed, willing it away.

"You do not know the words, but you understand their meaning because dragons are born understanding," he said. "They are writ in your soul." He reached out and laid a gentle hand, gnarled by age and callused by work, upon her shoulder. "We are willing to help if you are willing to learn."

Sabrin said nothing at first. She wasn't sure how willing she was to learn, in truth. A part of her was still convinced she would wake up at any moment. But she knew with even more certainty that this was the state of things and she could not run. Not really. Not when they would just call her back.

 _Dovahkiin_.

That word had made her itch. It was a challenge and an affront and simple, base curiosity all rolled together and she didn't understand it or the need to answer to it that had clawed at her since the word had split the sky at the gates of Whiterun.

So, that just left this then? She had to throw herself headlong down this path for better or worse or spend the rest of her life trying to run from something that didn't seem like it could be outrun.

She had been raised better than to fight unwinnable battles.

"My name is Sabrin."

The man seemed pleased by this and nodded. "I am Arngeir. I speak for the Greybeards," he said as he stood. He gestured to the doors behind him. "Welcome to High Hrothgar."

* * *

 _Kiir do Bormahu_ , _hi_ _los_ _Dovahkiin -_ Child of Akatosh, you are Dragonborn. _  
_


	5. Of Dragons

"You have met her then."

It had been many years since Arngeir had known Paarthurnax to display such an interest in things outside his meditations. The ancient dragon nearly seemed youthful again, his eyes bright and filled with eager curiosity.

Arngeir did not envy his master's lonely existence. He and the other monks had chosen their solitary lives, but they yet had each other. Paarthurnax had no such companionship—no one of his own kind he could seek counsel with. And the man wondered if any beast was truly meant to be so alone, even a dragon.

"She…" Arngeir thought of the girl, who had so effortlessly breezed through the previous day of training. The words came to her readily, as if she had learned them long ago and simply needed to remember the power they held. At present, she was sleeping inside the monastery, having collapsed in the first bed offered to her. He sighed. "She is much younger than I anticipated. I do not think she is up for this task."

"Regrettable. But that is not your choice."

The old man sighed.

Night had fallen on the mountain and the winds whistled around the ancient stone of the monastery and through the emptiness of the courtyard, blowing the snow one way and then the other. Paarthurnax perched on one of the stone rises, his wings folded close. Outlined against the moon and the dancing lights of the auroras, he looked magnificent, the light forgiving to his gray and weather-beaten scales, and his manner was quiet and serene.

Arngeir could sense otherwise. "You are eager to meet her," he hedged warily.

The dragon looked down at him and a sound, like a laugh, rumbled in his throat. "You know me well, _fahdon_ ," he said. "I admit, I am… impatient. There is… _bahlok. Frin._ "

Arngeir shook his head. "I understand, but I do not think that is wise. Not yet. We know so little of her."

"You worry." The dragon laughed again. "But you disagree even with yourself."

The monk sighed and looked back at the monastery as if looking in on the girl herself. "There is a war raging within her," he said. "She agreed to be taught simply because she believed she had no other choice. I do not believe she would have come at all, were she not compelled, and I do not have the words to quell the turmoil in her."

" _Niid_. Few would choose her burden if they truly understood it," Paarthurnax agreed. He shifted his weight and his great talons scraped against the stone beneath him as he resettled himself. "It is not in _dov_ to change. We do not age, we do not die; we do not change. Yet she is being asked to change all she knows of herself." He tipped his head and blinked, slowly. " _Drem, fahdon. Drem ahrk tiid._ "

* * *

Fahdon- Friend

Bahlok, Frin- Hunger and eagerness, respectively. "Hunger" here used to mean anticipation (though with dragons it usually has a destructive meaning).

Drem ahrk tiid- Patience and time.


End file.
